Vodnik, Valentin

Vodnik, Valentin

 

Born Feb. 3, 1758, in Zgornja-Šiška; died Jan. 8, 1819, in Ljubljana. Slovene poet. A figure in the national renaissance; educator.

Vodnik received a theological education. He was the editor and only writer of the first Slovenian newspaper, Lublanske novice od vsich krajov cqliga svgjta (1797-1800). He was a reformer of school education, and he compiled a grammar book and a dictionary. In 1781 he also began to publish poems. His collection Experiments in Verse (1806) contained the first Slovene verses written in the lively national language. Vodnik aroused a feeling of national selfconsciousness through his reconstruction of episodes of folk history (the ode Resurrected Illyria, 1811) and his treatment of humorous, everyday subjects.

WORKS

Pesni. Ljubljana, 1869.
In Russian translation:
” Vliublennaia Militsa.” In the book Poeziia slavian. Edited by N. V. Gerbel’j. St. Petersburg, 1871.

E. I. RIABOVA